Chelsea striker Daniel Sturridge is confident his football will do his talking for him when he gets the opportunity.

15. Daniel Sturridge

The 23-year-old, who is behind Fernando Torres in the Stamford Bridge pecking order, has found chances limited this season and 10 of his 11 club appearances have come off the bench.

Despite that lack of game time, he could still feature prominently for England in this week's friendly in Sweden and the forward believes he will emerge strongly from the situation.

He said: "I am getting my head down and focusing on the game on Wednesday. I am not worrying about the situation at my club.

"I will get my opportunity at some stage and when I do have my opportunity I will show what I can do.

"It is difficult to judge me as a player and say my goalscoring record is this or that when I do not play regularly. Not playing regularly is the most difficult thing for anyone to handle.

"If anyone says to you, 'If you don't play, you are fine,' it's a lie. I do not believe it is easy to not play and then switch it on like a light. You cannot do that, you have to play regularly.

"I prefer playing from the beginning of games but if I cannot do that, then fine, I will continue to work hard in training and not stress about whether I am not playing or not. I will let my football do the talking."

In the absence of Wayne Rooney and Jermain Defoe through injury, Sturridge is one of only two strikers in this week's England squad with caps.

Manchester United's Danny Welbeck is the most recognised forward in the group while Hodgson has also included uncapped duo Wilfried Zaha and Raheem Sterling.

Sturridge has won just three caps himself, the first against Sweden a year ago and all three of them coming as a substitute.

He said: "It was fantastic to get my first cap against them at Wembley and hopefully there'll be a lot more caps for me in the future.

"It has been great to be involved and it's been great for the manager to show confidence in me to pick me for this friendly.

"If I start it will be fantastic but it is the manager's decision and I will just go out there and show him what I am capable of doing, whatever amount of minutes he gives me."

Sturridge suffered a meningitis scare in the summer but recovered to feature for Great Britain at the Olympics and is looking forward positively.

He said: "It has been a whirlwind 12 months. I've had highs, lows, everything thrown at me.

"It was hugely character-building. The meningitis was the hardest point of my life, the most emotional period I have had, but I am glad I recovered.